Carmen Morinello

I read with considerable interest your article on the two lobbyists Carmen Morinello and Frank Elfend (Dec. 22). In February of 1989, we received a letter from the Presley Corp. informing us that in order to develop the Highland Hills project it was necessary to construct a storm sewer system and a maintenance road across our property. We were told if we did not reach an agreement with them in 15 days, the Presley Corp. would ask the city of Anaheim to take eminent domain action against us. Messrs.

I read with considerable interest your article on the two lobbyists Carmen Morinello and Frank Elfend (Dec. 22). In February of 1989, we received a letter from the Presley Corp. informing us that in order to develop the Highland Hills project it was necessary to construct a storm sewer system and a maintenance road across our property. We were told if we did not reach an agreement with them in 15 days, the Presley Corp. would ask the city of Anaheim to take eminent domain action against us. Messrs.

With a $4.7-million deal in the works, lobbyists Frank Elfend and Carmen Morinello were in good spirits before ducking into a negotiating session last winter with Anaheim city officials. There to sell the city a prized parcel of Pastor Ralph Wilkerson's Melodyland Christian Center, the lobbyists had already captured the attention of officials.

With a $4.7-million deal in the works, lobbyists Frank Elfend and Carmen Morinello were in good spirits before ducking into a negotiating session last winter with Anaheim city officials. There to sell the city a prized parcel of Pastor Ralph Wilkerson's Melodyland Christian Center, the lobbyists had already captured the attention of officials.

VTN Corp., an Irvine engineering and land-planning firm, vowed Monday to appeal a $3.5-million negligence verdict handed down late last week by a San Diego Superior Court jury. Jurors in the complex case held the company's land-planning subsidiary responsible for an investment group's losses after a newly incorporated city cut back the number of units that could be built on a property engineered by VTN.

As recession grips the nation and Southern California, Anaheim clings to its ambitious dreams of expanded facilities for tourism, the industry that made it what it is. And developers continue to wield a great deal of influence in City Council politics. Recent articles in The Times have taken a look inside the campaign financing process to reveal a system awash in money. The bottom line seems to be that if you want access, you can get it by paying for it.

Four City Council candidates have raised more than $10,000 for their campaigns, statements filed recently with the city clerk show. Sharon Ericson, who is president of the largest city employee union and an office supervisor in the Parks and Recreation Department, reported raising $38,095 for her campaign treasury. Lou Lopez, an Anaheim police officer and a member of the Anaheim City School District and Anaheim Union High School District boards of education, reported $15,143.

The five city councilmen raised more than $190,000 last year in campaign contributions, with most of the money going to pay off debts accumulated in previous campaigns, statements filed recently with the city clerk show. Mayor Tom Daly raised the most last year--$88,151, records show. But most of that went to pay off loans and bills he had left over from his 1992 campaigns for mayor and the council.

In this city, where politicians say it takes $100,000 just to be a contender for municipal office, the cost of winning and maintaining council seats is starting to take its toll. Council members claim that the hundreds of thousands of dollars pouring into city campaign coffers has done little more than enhance the perception that big contributions have colored decision-making at City Hall.

If there were ever any doubts about who has held sway over the city's trash industry, they were buried along with Cosmo (Dick) Taormina. On that spring day in 1984, top city officials crowded Anaheim's First Christian Church to pay their respects to the gregarious man some called the "garbologist." After the church service, a convoy of polished trash trucks--some from competing firms--met the long, slow funeral procession at the cemetery gates.